Southern epistemologies

This international course on Epistemologies of the South, taught by Boaventura de Sousa Santos, aims to present and debate the knowledge produced in the South, a basis of reflection for social transformation in the current times. In other words, as a study of various possibilities revealed from the Epistemologies of the South, this curricular unit has as its theoretical and methodological objective the overcoming of the Eurocentric model characteristic of modern thinking, namely, the abysmal thinking.

Knowing from do Sul and how sul requires a different political and epistêmic orientation. O Sul Global, the central theme of this course, seeks to reconfirm and validate the knowledge produced by the oppressed, by women and men who suffer from the injustices, oppression, domination and exclusion caused by capitalism, colonialism and patriarchy. As Epistemologies of the South, as a metaphor for exclusion, for the silencing and for the destruction of people and knowledge, we attempt to give body to the knowledge and experiences of the global South, based on methodological and reflective assumptions in dialogue, in contrast to any ethnocentric proposal.

The teachers of the course will try to problematize, from different geopolitical and epistemic spaces, the conditions for a horizontal dialogue between knowledges, for the ecologies of knowledge. These dialogues and the lições that they contain reflect the innovations that occur in the countries and regions of the global South. This demanding commitment presupposes availability for mutual recognition, intercultural understanding, political and ideological convergence, respect for identity and celebration of diversity, as conditions for a more democratic dialogue in the global world.

The construction of knowledge from the Epistemologies of the South requires other working methodologies. Learning as one's own, in its diversity, means going beyond conventional academic knowledge. Building dialogues between different knowledges and struggles seeks to give visibility to the people and social groups whose practices are only built from this knowledge. Only then will it be possible to develop alternative narratives that question the impossibility of thinking about differences (sexual, ethnic, racial, class, caste, religious, etc.) with equality, an intimate connection between local and global, projects of other economies and other political societies. In the second part of the course it is proposed to map, present and discuss a variety of work methodologies anchored in the body of knowledge developed from the perspectives of Epistemologies of the South, privileging the ecology of knowledge and the possibilities of intercultural translation between knowledge born in struggles.

The objective of this office is to support the preparation of the final work of the Specialization in Epistemologies of the South. It will support the identification of the topic of the final work by interlinking the topics addressed throughout the International Course such as the research/action interests and the students' own trajectories. It seeks to support the identification and justification of the matter to be addressed; consolidate the conceptual and methodological tools worked out and support the production of the final work, which can be written and audiovisual, performative or of another genre.

Summary: The seminar proposes a journey between some contemporary theories on migration and its readings in Latin America, such as around material and symbolic places in modern and historical colonial history, such as the Mediterranean Sea and the internal diasporic circuits for Africa and Africa for Latin America. Categories such as intersectionality and even differential, contemporary migration policies, conflicts and experiences of struggles around borders will be explored.

Coordinator: Karina Bidaseca (Universidade Nacional de San Martín, Universidade de Buenos Aires) and Maura Brighenti (Universidade Nacional de San Martín).

The objective of this curricular unit is to discuss how the coloniality of power is reflected in bodies marked by gender and social class. Coloniality is an open wound that reflects on our bodies as an indissoluble mark. We propose that a situated and liberating aesthetic as practiced by the artists considered here allows us to break the legacy of victimization and violence. In this course we place this paradigm in dialogue with other writings that also propose a reflection on the importance of a situated and liberating aesthetic. The main contribution of the course is to expose students to a wide network of theorists who construct different interpretations of thinking about the coloniality of power. Based on this, students will review critical theories about decolonial aesthetics and how it is applied to the following artists: Ana Mendieta, Zanele Muholi, Regina José Galindo, Shirin Neshat, Fatima Mernissi, Teresa Margolles, Adriana Varejão, Joyce Kozlof, Mona Hatoum, among others.

Coordinator: Marta Sierra (Kenyon College) and Karina Bidaseca (Universidade Nacional de San Martín, Universidade de Buenos Aires).

Summary: This seminar is structured around the theme of the Pandemic, many representations and two diverse knowledges, practices and voices that emerge from the geographical, geopolitical and epistemic South as you respond to each other, creating alternative(s) and resistance(s), seeking a more far-reaching, horizontal and heterogeneous knowledge. 

As the narratives and creativity of researchers, activists, citizens, patients, therapists and caregivers express, their demands and mourning strategies are the starting point, something that links the teaching team in their different reflections. The theoretical and empirical approaches will be presented by teachers/researchers from South America, Africa and South Europe, with lines of work articulated with current strategies that start from other knowledge, where science is just two very many pieces of knowledge in dialogue. Linking the pandemic to the remaining spheres of existence, this seminar aims to rethink health and COVID-19, opening up to reflection as the interweaving of incorporated, scientific and creative knowledge, learning through academia, or activism, through imagination and lived experience. Our three-month duration, the online seminar will have 12 classrooms, with the first and last (opening and enclosing) presented for the coordination.

Coordination: Susana de Noronha and João Arriscado Nunes (Centro de Estudos Sociai, Universidade de Coimbra, Portugal)

Summary: With an attentive eye to the forms of construction of knowledge and biocultural actions in the territories of the Global South, the objective seminar is to analyze the various responses to global problems, the civilizational collapse and the forms of mourning in the territories to defend the right to life. To locate and study the impact of capitalist modernity on socio-territorial coloniality projects with a historical matrix, we will seek to build dialogues around the new perspectives of decolonial research that narrate the practices of construction of knowledge from the South.

Coordinator: Antonio Ortega (Ação da Rede Sul de Formação de Descolonialidade)

Summary: In many societies of the global South, deeply marked by the colonial relationship, or seja, knowledge about their history and built on assumptions, methodologies and sources that perpetuate the maintenance of Eurocentric perspectives. This is a colonial heritage that is intended to be replaced by an agenda for the production of plural knowledge and intercultural translations, based on an analytical study on oral, collective and personal histories, based on the arts and two creative spaces.
The seminar presents research developed in diverse social and political contexts, reflecting on how to educate new generations in the histories and struggles for social justice that are founded on cultural and artistic expressions such as cinema, literature, theater, music, plastic arts, oral narratives, street arts, privileged means of communication, production of knowledge about these histories and their cultural identities.

Coordinator: Marisa Ramos Gonçalves (CES - Centro de Estudos Sociais da Universidade de Coimbra), Maria Paula Meneses (CES - Centro de Estudos Sociais da Universidade de Coimbra) and Iolanda Vasile (CES - Centro de Estudos Sociais da Universidade de Coimbra)

To participate, you must register on the website.

Registration will be open between December 12 and April 5.

Upon completion of the registration process, you will receive confirmation by e-mail.

If any of the mandatory training sessions are not completed, in all cases, an additional amount must be paid to recover the aforementioned credit.

If a student decides not to take the Specialization or International Course before its formal start, he or she may request a refund of the registration fee. CLACSO will calculate the amount equivalent to 10% of the administrative allowances.

Exceptional criteria: In exceptional cases, in the first two months of the start of the specialization, someone may request to leave the tour and resume it the following year. In all cases, the reasons justifying the request must be presented in writing. Two months after the start of the course, it will no longer be possible to request this procedure.

If a student decides not to take the International or Specialization Course before its formal start, he or she may request a refund of the registration fee. CLACSO will calculate the amount equivalent to 10% of the administrative allowances. After all, no refund will be made.

The classrooms will start in April 2022 and will be completed in March 2023.

All registered participants will receive the necessary instructions to access the classrooms, bibliography and discussion forums through the CLACSO Virtual Training Space.

The navigation access to the Virtual Training Space happens in a simple and clear way. In any case, a technical and academic support team will always be at your disposal.

You must certify the International Course, two (2) eletive Virtuais Seminars, a support office to carry out the final work and carry out the final work.

To obtain the title of the Specialization, you must conclude a final monographic work. The support office for the completion of final work is required and will assist you in the process.

You must participate in the classrooms and activities proposed by the teachers and do the final monographic work.

However, the International Course Specialization requires certificates for Flacso Brazil and CLACSO.

The specialization has a total workload of 360 hours and an international course of 90 hours.

The submission of the declaration of conclusion will be done digitally and is completely free.

The international Specialist diploma is issued by the Secretary-General of the Flacso, located in Costa Rica. The values ​​and procedures for issuing and sending the international diploma can be consulted on the Flacso Brazil page: https://flacso.org.br/?page_id=24376

The Specialization in the International Course requires credentials from Flacso Brazil and CLACSO.

The international Specialist diploma is issued by the Secretary-General of the Flacso, located in Costa Rica. The values ​​and procedures for issuing and sending the international diploma can be consulted on the Flacso Brazil page: https://flacso.org.br/?page_id=24376.

See the table of prices and modalities, available above.

If the international certification is not issued by the General Secretary of the Flacso, an additional fee must be paid.*

 

*The issuance of the printed diploma, together with the grade history, costs USD 200,00 (two dollars). The value includes the sending of two printed and assigned documents for the student's residential address. The procedures for issuing and sending the international diploma can be consulted on the Brazil Flacso page: https://flacso.org.br/?page_id=24376.